Where No One Has Gone Before
by Mengde
Summary: Space may be the final frontier, but within that frontier, there are no limitations. No barriers that cannot be overcome. And no matter how he protests, it is entirely Han Solo's fault that Luke Skywalker has found himself on the bridge of the Enterprise-E.
1. Teaser

Hello. My name's Mengde, and I haven't written a Star Trek/Star Wars crossover fanfic in more than ten years.

No time like the present.

* * *

**Where No One Has Gone Before**

**I**

Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master, grimaced as the hull of the _Millennium Falcon _shuddered with the impact of laser blasts.

"What exactly did you do?" he asked, trying to maintain his veneer of calm. The manic tinge to his tone told him he was only partially successful.

Han Solo, former smuggler and husband of the current Chief of State of the New Republic, uttered an extremely foul phrase in Huttese. "I didn't know they had pocket patrol craft with engines lit!" he said, sending the _Falcon _into a complex series of evasive loops. "It's not my fault!"

"I didn't say it was your fault," Luke said, resisting the urge to clench his teeth. "I asked what exactly you _did._"

"So I had to _do _something?" Han asked, his voice all hurt and indignation. "Maybe Alvarro just decided he wanted the bounty on our heads! The Hutts still technically got one up."

Chewie, in the co-pilot's seat, rumbled something contrary-sounding.

"Chewie's right," Luke said. "You wouldn't have dragged me out here if you'd thought there would be some real danger." A bark from the Wookiee. "Sorry, dragged _us _out here."

"Fine! I may have accused a dealer of having a skifter in his deck," Han said.

The hull rang out again. Luke fought down the impulse to also indulge in some profanity. "You thought it would be a good idea," he said, "to accuse a dealer in Alvarro's Den of cheating?"

"But he was!"

"Alvarro's Den. The single most renowned spaceborne casino in this quadrant. With every reason to want to protect its reputation from the slander of famous guests."

Chewie contributed his two credits to the discussion. "No, I don't think killing us is a preferable outcome to their name being besmirched," Luke said. "It seems kind of short-sighted. But right now they've got their lasers breathing down our necks, thanks to Han."

"Can we make the jump to hyperspace yet, or is there some reason you two feel like your criticism needs to happen in realspace?" Han snapped.

Luke's Shryiiwook wasn't perfect, so when Chewie rattled off an answer about gravitational eddies and fluctuations, he wasn't sure exactly what the problem was. So he asked, "How long?"

He definitely understood the phrase _ten minutes._

"There are six of them on our tail!" Han said. "We can't keep juking them for ten minutes!"

"I'll get on the dorsal quad battery," Luke said, beginning to unstrap himself.

"Wait!" Han said. "You can't. I wasn't lying when I said Leia wanted me to come here as a diplomatic envoy. I was _supposed _to meet with Alvarro and talk about establishing a trade route through his station. Things just kinda got out of hand."

"So you've torpedoed the mission, but the only chance of ever getting him to talk to anyone from the New Republic is _not _to blow up his hired goons," Luke said.

"Pretty much, yeah."

Luke reflexively glanced at the seat next to him, expecting Threepio to chime in with probabilities of survival or a simple 'we're doomed,' but Han had left the protocol droid on Coruscant.

"Fine. Hold on."

Closing his eyes, Luke extended his senses out beyond the cockpit of the _Millennium Falcon, _out into the cold reaches of space which surrounded them like a vast, black ocean. He felt the Force flowing through him, enveloping him; he felt the ripples caused by the ship, and the patrol craft in pursuit. He reached out and touched the minds of the ships' pilots.

Four humans, two aliens – a Trandoshan and a Rodian, from the feel of them. Those two would be more difficult to sway, but Luke knew he could get through to the four human pilots.

_Turn back. This is not where you want to be. It's not safe here._

Three of the craft immediately peeled off, heading back for the station. The fourth stayed doggedly on course, its laser cannons spitting hot bolts of death at the _Falcon._ Luke grimaced; he had never been comfortable with forceful persuasion rather than simple suggestion. It strayed too close to the Dark Side for his comfort. He increased the pressure. _Go away!_

That did it. Hesitantly at first, but with increasing certainty, the pilot swung about and headed back for the station.

"I don't know what you just did, kid, but we only got two of 'em on us now," Han said. "Good job."

"I can't persuade the others without danger," Luke replied. "It's a risk I'll take, but only if I have to."

"Well, you might _not _have to, if a certain somebody can get the damn navicomputer to work," Han told him.

Chewie began a long, bellowing rant at a speed too fast for Luke to really keep up; he heard something about _very complex _and _passive-aggressive _before the ship gave a horrible wrench.

"What in the stars was that?" he asked.

"Uh," Han said. "Those gravitational eddies Chewie was talking about? I think I know where they're coming from."

There was a hole, in space.

Looking into the center was like looking into pure, endless void. It _hurt. _So Luke looked at the jagged edges of the hole, which glowed a hot, electric blue and shimmered wildly, like the fabric of reality was burning away.

He realized the hole was getting bigger.

"Uh, Han?" he asked.

"I'm trying!" Han said frantically. "But the pull's too strong!"

Chewie howled mournfully.

Luke tried to extend his senses into the void, to probe it, but he felt nothing at all. It was like the anomaly wasn't even there. He _did _feel the patrol craft behind them peeling off, far enough away themselves to be able to escape. It did little to mollify his feelings about their current predicament.

"Out of the frying pan and into the Hutt's mouth," Han muttered, desperately yawing the _Falcon _back and forth in an attempt to break out of the hole's grip. "Luke, you got any bright ideas?"

Size mattered not, Luke thought, but in this case, the sheer mass of the hole and the vast power of its gravitational field _was _a bit of a roadblock. "I can't do anything," he said. "Chewie, can you override the hyperdrive's safety interlock to let us jump inside the gravitational field?"

Chewie's answer was a short negative, followed by a sarcastic comment about how it was so useful to suggest that idea now, rather than three minutes ago when he might have had time.

The hole loomed large enough to eclipse their entire field of view.

"I want you to know," Han said, "that you're the best friends a man could ever ask for."

"Well, there is a bright side," Luke murmured.

"What?"

He grinned, trying not to let fear overwhelm him. "This time, Han, this really wasn't your fault."

* * *

Ordinarily, Captain Jean-Luc Picard's policy was not to hover at his officer's stations. In this case, he felt fairly justified in making an exception.

"Is there a problem, Captain?" Geordi asked, looking up from the engineering console.

Picard gave him a thin smile. "Not at all, Mister La Forge. I'm simply recalling the last time we performed a deep subspace probe of this nature, and how that led to beings from another dimension kidnapping and vivisecting members of my crew."

He watched his chief engineer's artificial eyes squint in a grimace. "True, Captain, but we're taking extra precautions this time. And unless we perform this scan, we're never going to understand where the hell this thing came from."

Glancing over his shoulder at the viewscreen, Picard looked at the hole in space which had appeared, without explanation or warning, within a light-week of Deep Space Four. The _Enterprise_-E had been the closest starship – he paused for a moment to reflect on how often that proved to be the case – so they had been sent to investigate.

Three days of scanning had turned up precisely nothing of any use.

After seventy-two hours of throwing themselves at a brick wall, Data had proposed using a deep subspace scan to try to gain more information on the anomaly. There were risks, of course, but as Geordi had just said, they were taking every possible precaution.

So why did he have this looming presentiment of disaster?

"Mister Data," he asked, "would it interfere with the operation of the scan if we were to raise our shields?"

"It would slow the scan's efficiency by three point eight percent," Data replied promptly from his position at con. "Is there a reason you believe the shields to be necessary, sir?"

Picard shook his head. "Just a gut feeling, Data. I've been uncomfortable ever since we arrived."

It was a testament to the android's advancement over the past eight years that he did not immediately start firing off questions about how one should treat irrational instincts. Instead, he simply paused for a moment, gave a slight nod, and returned his attention to the console.

"Any change in the anomaly's rate of growth?" Will asked, twisting around in his chair to make eye contact with Geordi.

"No sir," Geordi replied. "Eight percent every three and a half hours, like clockwork."

"Which means it will begin to threaten Deep Space Four in a matter of weeks," Picard said. Everyone already knew, but he felt a reminder was in order. "They are counting on us to –"

His speech was cut short prematurely as the _Enterprise _rocked, the deck shifting under his feet from sudden turbulence.

"Status report!" he barked, catching his balance on the back of Geordi's chair.

"The anomaly has begun throwing off high levels of tachyons and excited gamma rays," Data reported, "coinciding with an eighty percent growth rate acceleration. I recommend we immediately move the _Enterprise _out to eight hundred thousand kilometers."

"Make it so!" Picard said, taking advantage of the momentary lack of turbulence to return to his chair. "Shields up!"

"Sir!" the science officer reported. He was a new transfer; Picard hadn't memorized his name yet. "There's something on the sensors emerging from the anomaly! It looks like a… vessel of some sort."

"Confirmed," Data said. "Unknown configuration and type. Thirty-six by twenty-four meters, one hundred and fifty metric tons."

"Life-signs?" Picard asked, his mind racing. The ship had survived passage through the anomaly, he had to assume, but it might not make it through a second trip.

"Three. Interference from the anomaly is making it difficult to establish a sensor or transporter lock."

"Get a tractor beam on that ship," Picard said. "Pull it into shuttle bay one, and move us out to eight hundred thousand kilometers."

"Aye, sir," Data responded.

"Number One, I want you to take command of the bridge for the moment," Picard said, lowering his voice slightly. "Have a security team meet me in shuttle bay one. This may be the first chance we get to discover something useful about this anomaly, and I confess I'm rather eager to see this mysterious vessel for myself."

Will nodded. "Of course, sir."

A moment later, Picard was in the turbolift, heading – he hoped – toward answers.

* * *

The first thing Luke realized, upon regaining consciousness, was that he was still alive. It was a pleasant surprise.

The second thing was that the turbulent trip through the anomaly had laid him out stomach-first across Chewie's lap. The Wookiee was still out cold, as was Han, who was slumped almost comically over the control panel.

He scrambled to his feet to look out of the cockpit. Outside, he could see a pristine hangar bay, done in mild shades of blue and grey. Alongside the _Falcon _were sleek, streamlined craft he didn't recognize.

There were also yellow-uniformed men surrounding the ship, with what were obviously rifles of some sort.

"I have a bad feeling about this," Luke sighed to himself.

He grabbed his lightsaber and got ready to step outside to meet their latest hosts.


	2. Act One

**II**

As Luke moved for the ramp, he stretched out with the Force to try to get a sense of who was out there.

Mostly human, he thought, though there were a few aliens he didn't recognize. Expanding the sphere of his awareness, he felt the contours and thrumming power of a ship, as well as the glows of life within it. It wasn't a particularly large vessel they were on, but he didn't recognize the design, and that was troubling. Where in space were they?

Narrowing his focus again, Luke identified the commander. The man glowed with the unmistakable aura of authority. What was more interesting was the fact that he was outside, striding around to the front of the _Falcon._

The rest of the armed men were certainly cautious, even fearful, but Luke felt no overt hostility. That was reassuring. He hung his lightsaber at his belt, not wanting to walk down the ramp of the _Falcon _wielding a weapon if he could help it. Taking a deep breath, he slapped the ramp control.

He slapped it again, a moment later, and this time it actually worked.

The familiar steam hissed from the hydraulics of the old craft as he descended to the gleaming deckplates, his austere black robe billowing about him. The commander was waiting, flanked by a pair of guards. He was a bald, dignified-looking man, with stern features and an almost regal bearing. Luke instantly felt respectful of the man, despite knowing literally nothing about him.

"I'm Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master," he said, opening his arms in what he hoped was the universal gesture of peace in this corner of space. "I'm here peacefully." He paused. "Wherever here is."

The commander gave him an amicable smile. "Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation starship _Enterprise._ A pleasure, Mr. Skywalker."

"Just Luke is fine," Luke said, noting the man's decision not to use his title of Master, which was actually more than a little refreshing. He didn't sense any disrespect, which made him think that Picard genuinely didn't know what Luke's position entailed – an idea that fit with the air of puzzlement the man was currently emanating.

The lack of formality seemed to take Picard aback for a moment, but he rallied quickly. "Very good then… Luke. You'll forgive my straightforwardness, but we were hoping you might tell us how you came to pass through the anomaly."

Luke blinked. "Uh, we were being chased by some hired guns of Alvarro's after a slight… incident, and the thing just opened up in front of us. Pulled us straight in. Did the same thing happen to you?"

"No," Picard said. He was definitely confused, but he was keeping his expression under control. "When the anomaly first appeared near Deep Space Four, we were dispatched to investigate and try to determine its origin. You are saying you were present at the moment of its origination three days ago?"

"There's no way to tell how long we might have been in there, so that could be the case, but I don't know anything about a Deep Space Four," Luke said. "If you don't mind my asking, which New Republic fleet are you a part of? I don't recognize you, or your uniforms… or really anything about this ship."

He felt more and more of Picard's wariness giving way to curiosity. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with the New Republic," Picard said. "My ship is part of Starfleet, the military branch of the United Federation of Planets. You've never heard of the Federation?"

There was a moment of dead silence.

It was broken by the sound of an angry Wookiee charging out of the _Falcon._

"No, Chewie!" Luke shouted as he desperately interposed himself between seven and a half feet of raging fur and the now extremely nervous guards. "They don't mean us any harm! There's just some confusion to sort out!" Chewie, who until this point had been shouting wordless Wookiee battle cries, opened his mouth to protest.

He looked just as surprised as Luke when, instead of the guttural sounds of Shryiiwook, a modulated, lightly accented voice in perfect Basic emerged from his throat. "They've tractored us into their ship and –" He stopped, clapped the hand that wasn't holding his bowcaster to his mouth.

"Chewie?" Luke asked, baffled.

"I have no idea what's going on," Chewie said.

"That would be the universal translator," Picard cut in. "You've… never heard of a universal translator, have you?"

"No," Luke said.

There was another moment of total silence before Picard finally said, "I think perhaps Dr. Crusher should examine the three of you for injuries, and then we should sit down and have a discussion. There seems to be rather a lot to sort out." He indicated the cockpit of the _Falcon_. "You did have a third companion, correct?"

Han chose that moment to stumble down the ramp, looking bleary-eyed. The buttons of the_ Falcon_'s control panel had left a series of jagged, asymmetrical marks on the right half of his face.

"Did we win?" he asked before his knees gave out from under him.

* * *

Two hours later, the three of them settled into a large conference room with Picard and the rest of his senior staff.

Luke and Han were evidently in excellent health. Picard's medical officer, Crusher, had never seen a Wookiee, much less tried to give one a medical exam, so they had decided to take Chewie at his suddenly-articulate word that he was fine.

"So," Picard said, taking his seat at the head of the table. "As best we can determine – Luke, Mr. Solo, Mr. Chewbacca – the three of you are from a parallel quantum reality."

"Just Han is fine," Han said for the fourth time. Luke noted, with more than faint amusement, that Picard did not seem nearly as comfortable according Han a lack of formality. Chewie, for his part, did not object to the ennoblement. "And can you explain that in words that everyone can understand?"

Picard, with a hint of irritation, looked to the android. "Mr. Data?"

The golden-skinned being got up and approached the wall-mounted display. Though it was hard to admit to himself, Luke found Data slightly unnerving. He was quite used to interacting with beings whose thoughts and feelings he couldn't detect – Threepio, Artoo – but Data was so startlingly close to human that Luke experienced constant cognitive dissonance around him.

"Essentially," Data began, "every time there is an event with the probability of multiple outcomes, there come into being multiple realities in which that outcome took place to the exclusion of the others. Thus, if we were to flip a coin, we would be giving birth to two quantum realities – one in which the coin comes up heads, and the other tails."

"I'm betting you don't get invited to a lot of sabaac games," Han said jokingly.

There was a thunderous silence.

"We believe," Data continued after a brief glance at Picard for his cue to resume, "that the three of you, and your ship, come from a quantum reality parallel to our own, but nevertheless extremely distant. The parallelism explains the existence of similarities – the laws of physics, the human species – but the distance accounts for the vast differences between our universes."

"That's why there's no Federation in your universe, and no New Republic in ours," Riker said. "It's also why we don't have anything remotely like the Force that Luke's described."

"But I haven't been cut off from it," Luke said. "I can feel the Force here just as I can in our own universe. Is there a reason for that?"

"I think I can explain that one," La Forge spoke up. "I believe that the anomaly came into being in our universe, and was extruded into yours through some kind of manipulation – in all likelihood, the deep subspace scan we were running on it."

Luke didn't miss the brief glance the engineer shot Picard, nor the way Picard frowned in way that said _we will discuss this later, and it will not be pleasant._

"When that happened," La Forge continued, "you got caught up in it, and you crossed the barrier between your universe and our own. And as long as the anomaly's there, our universes are connected. You said the Force is an energy field – well, it expanded into our universe as well."

"Interesting as this all is," Chewie spoke up in his unnervingly normal translated voice, "we have to return to our own universe. If we stay here, we'll never get to watch Han explain to Leia just how he managed to space the mission she gave him."

"Laugh it up, fuzzball," Han snapped. "I liked it better when I could pretend I didn't quite catch the sarcasm you'd throw my way."

"Oh, that was you pretending? I thought you were just being stupid," Chewie said. Luke had to applaud the universal translator; he could hear the dung-eating grin in Chewie's simulated voice.

"If I may interject," Data spoke up. "We, of course, understand the necessity of returning you to your universe."

"We _have_ been in this exact situation five or six times by now," Troi observed, her chipper tone not quite hiding her irritation.

"But the anomaly has increased its growth rate exponentially, and now represents a much greater hazard than when you initially passed through it," Data continued. "If we are not able to reverse its growth and return it to the state it was in when you first crossed, your vessel would not survive the trip."

"Are you saying the _Falcon_'s not up to it?" Han asked, immediately defensive.

"I did not intend any offense, Mr. Solo," Data replied. "Your craft's construction _is _quite esoteric, but that has nothing to do with the danger of crossing back over in the anomaly's current state. It would take a ship far more massive than yours, or even the _Enterprise, _to safely navigate the anomaly now."

Picard stood, tugging down the jacket of his uniform as he did. "And we _must _arrest its growth at any cost," he said. "At its accelerated rate of growth, the anomaly will begin to threaten Deep Space Four in two days." He looked at La Forge. "Geordi, I would like you to work with Mr. Chewbacca to link up with the _Millennium Falcon's _computer and see what we might learn from the ship's passage through the anomaly."

"Hey, I can help with that too," Han protested.

"Han, when was the last time you actually did maintenance on the _Falcon_ instead of telling me to do whatever I felt like with her?" Chewie asked him.

Han drummed his fingers on the conference table for a few moments before saying, "Look, I've just been _busy, _all right? With Leia's job, and the twins, it's…" He trailed off lamely.

"In the meantime, I've assigned each of you guest quarters," Picard continued. "We would welcome any other assistance you might be able to provide, but – I must admit that this anomaly has all of us out of our depth. It's proven much harder to analyze than similar phenomena we've encountered in the past."

"We understand," Luke said, standing as well. "Thank you for your hospitality."

He had a feeling these were going to be two very long days.


	3. Act Two

**III**

"I have never seen _anything _like this," Geordi said.

Chewbacca looked over his shoulder at the _Enterprise_'s chief engineer. The man was staring, openmouthed, at the pit of wires and exposed circuitry that was the _Falcon_'s computer core.

"In our defense, the ship came like that," Chewbacca said. "Han won it in a game of cards from a friend of his. When we tried to hermetically seal this area as a failsafe against damage to the computer, the heat skyrocketed and nearly burnt out the processors. When we tried to install a coolant circuit, the excess power draw shorted out the inertial dampeners. Rerouting that through the auxiliary batteries caused an overflow error in the navicomputer. And so on.

"Eventually we had every system on the ship carefully balanced out… and then, three weeks later, we discovered that with the computer core sealed up, _even with the coolant circuit, _the excess heat from the quad laser batteries would still burn it out. This happened in the middle of a firefight." Chewbacca shook his head and keened mournfully, which the universal translator left well enough alone. "Sometimes I hate this ship."

"If she's that unreliable, why don't you replace her?" Geordi asked.

"The _Falcon _is Han's pride and joy," Chewbacca sighed. "If I so much as made the suggestion, I'm sure he'd never speak to me again. And that would be awkward, since I _am _honor-bound to repay the life-debt I owe him. So I would just have to beat the silence out of him. And that's never fun."

Geordi gave him the kind of weak smile that humans always seemed to find when confronted with tales of offhand Wookiee brutality. "So is there a port I can interface my tricorder with, or…?" he asked.

"I think we've got a universal key plugged in here somewhere," Chewbacca replied. He folded his lanky frame into the cramped confines of the core and rooted around until he found the small black box, festooned with blinking lights. He blew the dust off it and handed it to Geordi. "Try that."

He watched as Geordi began tapping commands into his tricorder device. "Okay," the engineer said, "the systems are syncing up. There's a lot of garbage feedback, though." He furrowed his brow. "Chewbacca, I think your ship just told me to jump out an airlock."

"It doesn't like people it doesn't know," Chewbacca explained in what he thought was a helpful tone.

The look the man gave him suggested it was not.

A few more minutes' tinkering with the tricorder produced slightly better results. "This is interesting," Geordi said. "You actually got some usable data on the interior of the anomaly on your way through. I'll go ahead and send it up to the bridge for analysis."

"Good to hear," Chewbacca observed.

That took another minute. Afterward, Geordi closed his tricorder and looked around, clearly searching for the right words. "So… honestly, it usually takes longer than this to interface with an alien computer. It'll take a while to get the results back, so we have some time to kill."

Chewbacca peeled his lips back slightly, the Wookiee equivalent of pursing them.

"Care for a game of chess?"

* * *

Han sat at the bar in Ten-Forward, staring mournfully at the glass in front of him. A young man with an entirely too cheery expression had helpfully informed him that they only served synthehol, which supposedly mimicked the taste of alcohol without any of its detrimental effects.

"I've been lied to," Han muttered under his breath.

"That not to your taste?" someone asked him.

He looked up. A serene, dark-skinned woman with a comically oversized hat stood behind the bar, smiling at him.

"No, it's not," Han said. "I'm stuck on this ship until a bunch of people much smarter than I am can figure out how to do something to the anomaly outside, and I can't even drink myself under the table properly."

The bartender cast a conspiratorial glance around before reaching below the bar and retrieving a large, stoppered bottle of something violently green.

"What the hell is that?" Han asked.

She raised a hairless brow at him. "It's _green,_" she said, sounding offended that he had even asked. "Interested?"

Han carefully weighed the merits of the various options presented to him before deciding on throwing caution to the wind and seeing what _green _tasted like. "Hit me," he said. She poured him a shot, which he knocked back in one pull.

A moment later he was on the ground, coughing so hard it brought tears to his eyes. Through the blurry haze he could see the bartender looking down at him, her expression quizzical. "Are you alright?" she asked. "I've never seen anybody have quite that strong a reaction before."

With all the strength in his being, Han pulled himself back onto his barstool. "I guess _green_ is a little stronger than I'm used to," he said. "That stuff's disgusting."

"More?"

"Yeah."

This time Han took a careful sip and found he could stay in his chair, so he said, "Thanks."

"You're welcome." The bartender planted her elbows on the bar and rested her head in her hands, looking at him. "So. You're not from around here."

Han paused, the glass of _green_ halfway to his lips, before saying, "Word travels that fast on this ship?"

"Sort of," she replied. "I'm a friend of the captain. Guinan."

"Han," he told her. "Han Solo."

"So, Captain Solo," Guinan said. "You're not used to being useless, are you?"

That made him start coughing again, but only because the shock of the question made him choke _green _down the wrong pipe. After he'd caught his breath, Han told her, "No. I'm not. This is kind of a new situation for me."

"I imagine strange anomalies aren't really your area of expertise," Guinan said.

"No. I used to smuggle illegal cargo for whatever crimelord was paying the best rate at the time. Now I'm respectable, and it feels like I die a little more inside every day." Han took another sip of _green._ "Well, not really. I've got a wife and kids, and I love 'em. But being somebody people look up to and depend on's never been my favorite thing."

"Well, nobody's depending on you right now," Guinan pointed out. "You should be happy, but you're in here, drinking."

Han grimaced. "Yeah. Funny how that works, huh?"

"Oh, I know what you mean," Guinan assured him. "You remind me of an old husband of mine, actually. He was always trying to avoid responsibility too."

That at least made Han chuckle. "Why'd you two split up?" he asked, making the obvious assumption.

"Oh, we didn't split up," Guinan laughed. "He died."

"I'm sorry. What happened?"

"Old age."

It took Han a second to put together what she was saying – the _green _was apparently quite strong in more ways than just the obvious – but he managed to refrain from doing a double-take. "Oh. I see."

"I'm an El-Aurian," Guinan said. "We're a race of listeners, Captain Solo. And when you've been listening for as long as I have, you start to notice patterns in what people are saying, and what they actually mean."

"Yeah?"

She gave him an enigmatic smile. "Since I'm a bartender, I'll give you a piece of free advice. That husband of mine? He was always happiest when people were relying on him. Even if he didn't feel like he could fulfill their expectations, it made him feel worthwhile just knowing that people needed him."

"That right."

"Yes." Han looked up from his _green _just in time to see her give him a quick up-and-down look, followed by a wink. "He always was one of my favorites."

Maybe it was the _green, _but suddenly Han felt a rush of heat to his face. He might as well have been a schoolboy again.

"Enjoy your drink, Captain Solo," Guinan said, topping off his glass before moving away. "It's on me."

* * *

There were certain facts Luke had been forced to come to peace with about himself. He couldn't grow a beard to save his life. When he found something hysterically funny, he had an absolutely insane laugh. Sometimes he would remember Leia kissing him on Hoth and not feel quite as repulsed as he knew was right and proper.

He also wasn't very good at meditating.

It was particularly damning for a Jedi Master not to like meditating all that much, but Luke just didn't enjoy it. He could certainly do it, and do it well enough, but he vastly preferred being active to sitting perfectly still in one place and contemplating the mysteries of the universe, especially when he was in a situation like this.

So he was in the technological marvel which the _Enterprise _computer told him was called a holodeck, sparring with a remote.

It hadn't taken him much finagling to get the computer to recreate the standard training remote. The ship had been less than pleased with him when he'd started swinging his lightsaber around in the confined space of the holodeck, but he knew precisely where the walls were, even after he asked the computer to give him a misty jungle background to evoke memories of Dagobah.

Luke deflected another spray of holographic energy bolts into the distance. "Too easy," he said. "Can you make the projectiles faster and the remote fire them more quickly?"

"Specify parameter increase," the female voice of the computer told him primly.

"I don't know," Luke said, "a hundred percent on both of them?"

_That _definitely made a difference. He immediately whirled his lightsaber in a figure-eight loop about his body, battering aside a hail of red-orange projectiles from the small, round sphere. It began zipping around haphazardly, firing a nonstop spray of bolts at him. Luke gave himself to the Force, letting his awareness extend out from his body into the room around him, letting his conscious thoughts be submerged in the sea of instinct and action.

"Very impressive," a familiar voice sounded.

"Pause the remote," Luke said to the computer, turning to look at Picard. The captain had entered quietly, hands clasped in front of him in a posture which suggested he was sorry to have interrupted. "Captain Picard," he said, deactivating his lightsaber. "What can I do for you?"

"Oh, nothing," Picard replied. "I simply thought I might see how you were doing. Geordi tells me he has downloaded all the data you recorded on the interior of the anomaly and that it should be analyzed within a few hours."

Luke nodded. "That's good. Did you want to use this place? I can go somewhere else."

"No, not at all," Picard assured him. "I wouldn't dream of interrupting. Although…" He looked at the hilt of Luke's lightsaber. "I must admit a certain fascination with your weapon. Might I…?"

"Of course," Luke said, floating the weapon over with the Force. He carefully ensured the hilt landed in Picard's palm with the emitter pointed _away _from the captain. "The red switch activates it. It's a dead man's trigger, so don't let go of it, or else the blade will deactivate by itself. And be careful – the blade has no weight, so the weapon's difficult to handle."

Picard nodded before carefully holding the hilt away from himself and pressing the switch. The emerald blade sprang forth with its distinctive _snap-hiss._ "Extraordinary," Picard murmured, giving the weapon a few small, experimental swings. "I've never seen anything quite like this."

"The techniques for making them have been passed down through thousands of generations of Jedi," Luke said. "The most exotic part's the focusing crystal. I'd be willing to bet that the reason you've never seen anything like a lightsaber in this universe is because you don't have crystals with the necessary internal structure."

Picard nodded. "The blade has a peculiar gyroscopic effect," he observed before shutting it off and letting Luke float it out of his hand. "How do you manage to avoid severing your own limbs when you use it?"

"The Force is my ally," Luke replied. "It guides my actions and keeps me safe from harm. I can't explain it much better than that."

"A powerful gift," Picard said grimly.

"Yes. And not without its hazards." Luke returned the lightsaber to his belt. "I wouldn't be whole without it, though. The Force has allowed me to do more good than I ever thought possible. It's been my companion in places where I had none."

Picard gave him a smile that was almost paternal. "You just reminded me of one of my old instructors at the Academy," he said. "Admiral Rogriss. He would wax nostalgic about his first command, the _Caliburn. _Commanding that ship changed the course of his entire life. He could never explain the peculiar nature of his bond with it, not with words, but when I first commanded a starship…" He closed his eyes for a moment, and Luke could feel a wave of something ineffable emanate from the captain. "I finally understood."

Luke nodded. "I know what you mean." He hesitated, then decided to ask the question that had been on his mind since they'd arrived. "Captain Picard… I know we're concentrating on solving the problem posed by this anomaly, but what if the worst should happen? What if the three of us can't go back?"

He watched consternation furrow Picard's brow. "I'm afraid I'm not entirely sure," the captain finally said. "Certainly we would make every effort to find another method of returning you to your universe, but failing that, I'm sure you would be offered Federation citizenship – homes on Earth, career opportunities, and so forth."

"And what would happen to my connection to the Force?" Luke asked.

Picard looked pained. "I… don't know. I truly am sorry, but these are exceptional circumstances."

"I see." Luke looked up at the computer's rendition of what was supposed to look like Dagobah's night sky. The constellations were out of place, the cloud cover not nearly tempestuous enough. "Well, I'm sure your crew is doing everything they can."

"Of course."

They stood there in silence for a moment before Picard's combadge chirped. "Picard here," he said, tapping it.

"Captain," Data's voice came through. "There is another ship emerging from the anomaly. I suggest you return to the bridge at once, and bring our guests."

"On our way," Picard said, throwing a meaningful glance at Luke.

Luke nodded at him and swept after the captain, leaving the simulation of Dagobah behind.


	4. Act Three

**IV**

When Luke and Picard arrived on the bridge, the Jedi Master saw that Han and Chewie had beaten them there. Han looked a little unsteady on his feet, and Chewie had a distinctly surly air about him. It didn't show in his expression, which was as inscrutable as ever, but Luke could feel irritation rippling off the Wookiee in steady waves.

"You two okay?" he asked as he moved to stand with them to the right of the captain's chair, where Picard took his seat.

"Turns out _green_ is pretty strong," Han said, his expression bleary.

Chewie rumbled something the universal translator chose not to touch, followed by, "Geordi is a chess natural."

Luke opened his mouth, found he had nothing to contribute to the discussion, closed it.

"Mr. Data, report," Picard said, his tone of voice suggesting that he would be most pleased if the visitors would kindly shut up now.

"The anomaly has continued to grow at a steady rate since its rapid expansion at the time of the _Millennium Falcon_'s arrival," Data told him. "Two minutes and thirty-six seconds ago, the tachyon and gamma ray output of the anomaly spiked again, just as it did when the _Falcon _breached it, but many orders of magnitude higher. I moved the ship out to a safe distance before contacting you."

"When will we be able to determine the type of ship breaching?" Picard asked.

"The tachyons are making it impossible to get a solid lock on anything within three hundred thousand kilometers of the event horizon," an officer Luke didn't know reported from his station. "If this follows the same pattern as the emergence of the _Falcon, _once the ship's cleared the anomaly completely we'll be able to get a reading."

Luke reached out with the Force, trying to get a sense of what was approaching, but he almost immediately recoiled from the strange energies of the anomaly. He blinked as he realized he had fallen to one knee and was holding a hand to his right temple.

"You okay, kid?" Han asked, concerned. Luke felt the attention of the rest of the bridge's occupants center on him as well.

"I tried to get a feeling for what's out there with the Force," Luke replied, straightening up. "It wasn't fun."

"Are you alright?" Troi asked him. "Do you need to go to sickbay?"

"No, I'm okay. I just won't try that again." Luke grimaced. "All I could tell was that whatever's coming… it's big."

As if the universe had been waiting for just such a statement to herald the new arrival, space in front of the anomaly twisted and warped dramatically before snapping back into focus, revealing –

"What the hell is that?" Will exclaimed, unconsciously rising from his seat.

Luke felt the blood draining from his face. "That's a Super Star Destroyer," he said, feeling numb. "I thought they were all accounted for."

"Yeah. Me too," Han seconded, looking just as pale as Luke felt.

"Tactical analysis, Mr. Data!" Picard snapped, his composure wavering only for a moment.

"The vessel measures nineteen kilometers in length," Data replied. "Its hull is composed of an unknown alloy which seems comparable in tensile and ablative strength to duranium. Readings show over five thousand weapon emplacements of varying types; power levels suggest that though they are individually weak compared to our phasers, their sheer numbers could easily overwhelm our shields. The ship also has a shield system similar in design and power to our own. Seventy-five thousand life-forms aboard."

Picard turned to Luke, clearly shaken. "You have more than one vessel like this in your galaxy?"

"The New Republic commands one we captured," Luke replied. "Apart from that, we only know of five others that were ever built, and they've all been destroyed. Or so we thought."

"Every time we turn around it seems like another one of these damn things pops up," Han growled. "Where the hell are they finding these things?"

"Sir, we are being hailed," Data reported.

"On screen," Picard said, standing and tugging down his uniform.

The view of the massive ship was immediately replaced with a grainy, low-resolution picture of a Rodian sitting in a command chair, wearing what was clearly a civilian knockoff of an admiral's uniform. The Rodian's large, black eyes narrowed in an expression of pleasure, and his mouthparts clenched in the Rodian version of a grin.

"Alvarro?" Han sputtered. "What?"

Picard, who had been about to speak, shot Han a withering glance before starting again. "I'm Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation starship _Enterprise. _Please state your –"

"I," the Rodian said, his voice translated into appropriately menacing Basic, "am Alvarro Griska, master of the Super Star Destroyer _Hammerfist. _You have one minute to give me your unconditional surrender and turn the men under your protection over to me."

"You pirate, where the hell did you get that ship?" Han shouted at him, preempting Picard again. "There's no way you built that thing!"

"Solo," Alvarro laughed. "I bought it, if you must know. You'd be amazed what you can buy when you have a big enough pile of money."

"No wonder your damn dealers cheat!"

"Mr. Solo," Picard told him through clenched teeth, "control your outbursts or I will have you removed from the bridge." He turned to Alvarro. "I'm afraid I don't know who you are or why you want custody of my guests, but I'm afraid I must deny that request. Nor will I grant you a surrender of any kind. I do not recognize your authority, regardless of whatever vessel you may command."

"Human, I am taking those men prisoner to give me leverage over the New Republic," Alvarro sneered. "The only question is how intact I leave your puny little ship. The answer lies in your hands."

"Mr. Data, end transmission," Picard said. Data cut the com line; the image of Alvarro was replaced with the sight of his massive ship rolling to bring its enormous broadsides to bear. "Get us out of here immediately. Warp two."

"Aye, sir."

Luke felt the deck thrum beneath his feat as the _Enterprise _activated some kind of faster-than-light drive. The ship clearly didn't leave normal space, but the stars blurred to lines of coherent light on the screen and the _Hammerfist_ was instantly left behind.

Picard turned back to the three of them. "Gentlemen, we need to talk. Now."

* * *

A few minutes later, Picard leaned back in his chair in the conference room as Luke finished outlining the basic tactical capabilities of the ship they faced. It was not an encouraging report.

"Counselor," Picard asked Troi, "what could you sense of this Alvarro person? Was he as confident in his ship's abilities as he appeared?"

"Yes, absolutely," Troi replied. "As far as I could tell, he wasn't hiding anything."

"There's a first," Will commented wryly.

"The main question we are now faced with, then, is whether or not his ship is capable of catching the _Enterprise_," Picard stated. "How, precisely, does your hyperdrive function in comparison to a warp drive?"

The three guests all gave him a blank look. "Nobody except dedicated techs know how a hyperdrive _works,_" Chewbacca spoke up. "We just know how to repair one if it fails."

"Well, how fast does a ship with a hyperdrive go?" Geordi asked. "At maximum warp, the _Enterprise _can cover about two and a half light-years per hour."

Solo coughed. "Well, the _Falcon_'s got a top-of-the-line drive, which even Alvarro's Super Star Destroyer might not have, but it takes us… I'd say four or five days to head from Coruscant to the Outer Rim."

Luke leaned forward. "Coruscant's in the galactic core," he explained. "The Outer Rim is the edge of the galaxy."

Everyone sat there for a moment, sharing in a stunned silence at the incredible speed of such a device.

"But there's no way he's gonna follow you with that giant fancy ship of his," Solo said. "Just from what I saw on the bridge, you guys don't leave realspace when you use your drives. Hyperdrive puts you in hyperspace, and if you come out of hyperspace without knowing exactly where you'll be, you could end up in the middle of a star. There aren't any hyperspace charts of your galaxy, so Alvarro'll stay near the anomaly. He knows we have to go back to it to get home."

"And we must return to the anomaly and reverse its growth if we wish to save Deep Space Four," Data pointed out. "Therefore, we must find a way to combat the _Hammerfist._"

Solo snorted. "You've got one ship. The last time we killed a Super Star Destroyer it took two battle fleets to do it."

Picard shot him a glare. "The _Enterprise _may not be a match for this vessel in conventional warfare, Mr. Solo, but I believe we possess several distinct tactical advantages." He tapped his combadge. "Picard to…" He searched in vain for the sensor officer's name, gave up. "Picard to Sensors. Do you have a full report for us?"

"Yes, sir," the man replied. "Right away."

A moment later the officer entered the conference room and brought up the scans he'd done on the screen. Picard stared hard at him, trying to commit his features to memory. Brown eyes, curly hair, a beard much like Will's. "Thank you, Ensign…?"

The officer looked vaguely embarrassed. "Routh, sir."

"Thank you, Ensign Routh. Proceed."

Routh nodded and gestured at a wireframe analysis he'd compiled from the sensor data of the _Hammerfist._ "Before we had to leave, I managed to get a detailed enough scan of the enemy ship to pinpoint several key points. The two domes on the command tower are the shield generators. The ship's also got multiple large reactor cores along its length, and I picked up a lot of precisely regulated energy transfer activity midway along the spine. That suggests a computer core to me."

"Does this analysis agree with your knowledge of these vessels?" Picard asked his guests.

"Pretty much, yeah," Luke said. "There's no way anything in _our _universe could take out the shield generators without having to kill the shields the old-fashioned way first. Well, except a Death Star, but if there's one of _those _out there we don't know about…"

Picard raised an eyebrow. "Star Destroyers, Death Stars… Interesting nomenclature."

"They're Imperial designations," Chewbacca said. "Designed to inspire fear." The bitterness in his voice was palpable even through the translator.

"Captain," Data said, "based on the mass of the enemy ship, as well as their significant firepower advantage, I believe the best course of action would be to sabotage the vessel from within, disabling these key points in order to give us the upper hand. It would take hours to dismantle it traditionally."

"Agreed," Picard replied. "Mr. Routh, what kind of sabotage might we conceivably effect?"

"Well, judging from the size of everything involved, standard explosive charges probably won't make a difference," Routh replied. "If we could get a quantum torpedo in there…"

"The shields are too strong even for quantum torpedoes," Will disagreed.

Picard leaned forward. "Could we possibly beam a torpedo through their shields?"

"It is possible, sir," Data replied. "Judging from Mr. Routh's analysis of the vessel's shield system, it is not specifically designed to inhibit beaming, as ours are. We would still require pattern enhancers at the target sites, but it would be doable."

"Sorry," Luke said, "but – beaming?"

"We have a technology called a transporter beam that allows us to move objects or personnel from one place to another almost instantaneously," Picard explained. "The process is generally blocked by energy shields; however, since you do not possess the technology yourselves, it gives us an advantage in penetrating this ship's defenses."

"So what we're looking at," Will said, "is getting a team into the ship, where they can plant pattern enhancers at each target site. The _Enterprise _engages the ship in the meantime and tries to stay alive long enough to beam the torpedoes aboard for the sabotage."

"It seems like the soundest plan available on short notice," Data noted. "If we delay, the ship may move toward Deep Space Four and pose a more immediate threat than the anomaly's expansion."

"Then it's settled," Picard said, "unless any of you have an objection or something to add?"

Solo shook his head. "If you can actually pull this off, it should work. You're gonna have to worry about the _Hammerfist_'s fighter screen, though. He'll have snubfighters loaded, and if they get enough proton torpedoes off at once they could put a dent in your ship."

"We can fly defense against them," Chewbacca said, "but Luke should probably be part of the sabotage team, which leaves us a man down for one of the gun turrets."

"Mr. Data should be part of the sabotage team as well," Picard observed, "so I'll need Will here to take the con. Counselor?"

Troi shook her head. "I'd prefer to coordinate with the sabotage team from the _Enterprise. _If Worf were here I'm sure he'd be willing to go, but…" She looked past Picard. "Do you have something to add, Ensign?"

Picard turned, along with everyone else, to look at Ensign Routh, who suddenly looked like he'd been caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

He coughed. "Well, I… I've spent a few hundred hours in the holodeck running pre-twenty-second-century spaceflight simulations. Back when they had laser turrets." He shot an embarrassed glance at Picard. "Strictly during off-duty hours, sir."

"I see," Picard said, trying to hide his amusement. "We can have a subordinate relieve you if your services would be better utilized on the _Falcon, _Ensign."

"Sir, I –" Routh stopped talking and ducked as Solo chucked a comlink at his head.

"Kid's got decent reflexes," Solo said with a chuckle. "I'll take him."

Routh shot him a dirty look as he picked the comlink up off the floor. "If you think it's best, sir," he said, turning back to Picard.

"Frankly, Ensign, I doubt we will need a concerted sensor analysis during the battle," Picard said. "We won't need you to tell us that we are outnumbered, outgunned, and extremely outmassed."

"Then welcome aboard, kid," Solo said with a lopsided grin. "Chewie'll show you which button fires the guns."

Picard rose from his chair, headed for the bridge. They had a plan, a time limit, and the fate of a solar system resting on their shoulders.

He could only hope they would prove equal to the task.


	5. Act Four

**V**

"This is the weirdest control layout I've ever seen," Luke said.

He looked down, more than a little dismayed, at the array of smooth, strangely-spaced buttons on the console in front of him. The plan was for the infiltration team to launch in every shuttle the _Enterprise _carried. That way, a single errant turbolaser blast wouldn't spell a lethal end to their part of the plan.

Of course, as part of this plan, Luke was going to have to _fly _one of those shuttles.

"Is the control layout not to your liking?" Data asked. "It can be modified into a variety of arrays and configurations."

"It's not that," Luke said. "It's… where's the stick? Where are the rudders? Am I supposed to just pilot this thing with my hands?"

"Generally speaking, yes," Data replied. "Before the twenty-third century, small fighter craft were often used in combat, carrying nuclear or photonic payloads. Such craft had control interfaces similar to the ones you are describing. However, with the advent of widespread deflector shield technology, the limited amount of weaponry a fighter could carry quickly made such ships obsolete."

Luke tried to imagine a galaxy where snubfighters were useless, where all combat took place between capital ships. He didn't like the idea.

"Since then," Data continued, "small craft such as this are primarily used for the transportation of personnel and materiel, and are not designed for combat, carrying armaments only as a defensive measure. Thus, the need for more adaptable and intuitive control systems ultimately declined and they were replaced with standard LCARS interfaces."

"Thanks," Luke murmured, wondering if the android always talked this much. He still found it strange to be around the golden-skinned being – clearly alive, clearly a person as much as Luke or Han, but without that essential _droidness _that Luke was used to in artificial life-forms.

Data could clearly sense Luke's unease, so he leaned forward in his seat in what he must have felt was a conspiratorial or comforting gesture. "Do not worry," he said. "I will be doing most of the piloting. The copilot's responsibilities on a craft of this size are usually limited to navigation and shield management."

Luke forced a smile. "Well, those I can do," he told the android. "Just show me which buttons I should and shouldn't press."

The android proceeded to give him a crash course in copiloting a Federation shuttlecraft. Much to Luke's relief, the systems had obviously been designed such that even a nerfherder could use them – which was good, since his total lack of experience with this galaxy's technology put him at a severe disadvantage.

"And this," Data concluded, pointing at a large red button, "is the self-destruct control." He paused, cocked his head at Luke. "This is one of the buttons you should not press."

"Thanks," Luke said, perhaps a bit more dryly than was appropriate for a Jedi Master.

There was a chirping sound, followed by Picard's voice. "Attention," he said. "We will be dropping out of warp in four minutes. Infiltration teams will launch immediately and proceed to your target hangars. Stand by."

Luke looked out of the viewport at the open shuttlebay, a forcefield holding the air and heat inside. "You ready?" he asked.

"I am operating within all normal parameters," Data replied as he began to run preflight checks on the shuttle.

"Great," Luke said lamely. He pondered the appropriateness of the phrase for a moment before deciding on saying it anyway. "May the Force be with us."

Data frowned. "From my understanding of the Force, my status as an inorganic being precludes my being able to use it or be affected by it."

"It's not that simple, Data," Luke told him. "The Force permeates all things, organic or not. You don't have to be able to use it to be an agent of the Force, for good or otherwise."

For a moment, he could have sworn he actually felt something from the android – happiness? Acceptance? It was the faintest ghost of an emotion, as though it were reaching across a vast gap of experience and state of mind, but Luke hadn't taken the title Jedi Master just for the way it sounded.

Data smiled at him. "Thank you," he said. "Then I concur. May the Force be with us."

* * *

Han thumbed on the intercom in the cockpit. "You find everything okay, kid?" he asked.

"I think so," Routh's voice came back. "Does being upside down get less disorienting when we get into space? Staring at the deckplates is making me nauseated."

Han resisted the urge to laugh. Chewie had declared that he was taking the dorsal gun turret; it had been amusing to watch Routh transparently weigh the possible end results of arguing with a Wookiee and decide to take the ventral turret with quiet dignity and grace. "Sure does, kid," he replied, not bothering to clarify which half of the ensign's transmission he was responding to. "You ready for this?"

"Ready as I'll ever be, I guess."

"Chewie?"

"The turrets are fully charged and lit," Chewie's translated voice crackled over the intercom. "You remembered to check the deflector integrity, right?"

"Yes," Han said, trying not to let a sigh infiltrate his tone.

"Because this would be the worst possible time for it to fail," Chewie went on. "Especially since we can't jump to hyperspace if we need to get away."

"On the plus side," Han laughed, "we don't have to worry about the hyperdrive this time!"

"True."

"Is this ship… unreliable or something?" Routh asked.

There was a long moment of dead silence, followed by Chewie's quiet, firm answer.

"No."

* * *

Picard sat, tense, in his chair, watching the countdown timer in his armrest display march inexorably toward zero.

Will had taken Data's position at con, Deanna was occupying the communications console so she could coordinate with the sabotage teams, Geordi was in Engineering, and Beverly was standing by in sickbay to receive casualties. Lieutenant Daniels manned the tactical station.

Everything was in place, and Picard had taken his ship into combat dozens of times. Why now this nervousness that gripped him? He felt like a cadet again, running the Kobayashi Maru.

His mind's journey straight to that infamous simulation told Picard the reason for his tension. Despite the plan they had conceived, despite the talented officers under his command, he was afraid. The sheer size and power of the enemy warship, the vast number of combatants, all the unknown variables – it was almost like fighting the Borg again. Picard still preferred the current engagement to any conflict with the Borg, but it was a close thing.

He forced himself to take a long, deep breath and exhale slowly. Despite his misgivings, despite the vast odds arrayed against them, his crew had overcome such obstacles in the past. He had merely to trust in his crew, he told himself, and give his all as their captain.

He felt his fear vanish, replaced by determination.

The _Enterprise _dropped out of warp less than fifty kilometers from the _Hammerfist, _squarely in its ventral arc, where their scans had revealed the weakest concentration of weaponry. "All shuttles, launch!" Picard ordered. "Mr. Daniels, bring up the shields as soon as the shuttles are away. Number One, bring us up along their starboard axis to give their gunners something to shoot at. The less attention they pay the infiltration teams, the better."

"Aye, sir," both Will and Daniels sounded off.

"Infiltration teams are away," Deanna reported.

"Shields up, Captain," Daniels said. "Enemy weapons are powering."

"The _Hammerfist _is rolling to bring its starboard and dorsal guns onto us," Will spoke up. "I can match their rotation to keep us along their starboard axis."

"No, let them complete the maneuver," Picard instructed him. "Reinforce the port shields, Mr. Daniels, and fire phasers when ready. Attack pattern Omega."

He gripped his armrests, rigid in his chair. _So far, so good._

* * *

Luke suppressed a twinge of unease as Data brought their shuttlecraft hurtling out of the _Enterprise_'s shuttlebay. He could barely feel the acceleration; being in a craft this small with the inertial dampeners turned all the way up had led to the deaths of more than one of his friends. It was hard to know exactly what your fighter was doing when your maneuvers didn't pull and push you in your seat.

Still, Data seemed to handle the shuttlecraft with aplomb, and the twisting dive he pulled as the _Hammerfist _began to roll displayed exceptional piloting skill – especially with a control layout like this.

"Two minutes to entry," Data said. "Shields?"

"At maximum," Luke reported.

He knew he should be watching the _Hammerfist, _keeping an eye on its guns and watching for enemy fighters. Still, he couldn't help but stare as the _Enterprise _swept past the shuttlecraft, arcing up along the starboard axis of the Super Star Destroyer. Seeing the Federation battleship from the outside for the first time, Luke was struck by the grace of its lines, the aesthetic care that had been taken in crafting the ship. It reminded him of a Mon Calamari vessel, in some ways.

Then its entire saucer section lit up with a withering spray of energy blasts which streaked out to pound against the _Hammerfist_'s shields. These were no turbolasers, with their discrete bolts; they were solid lines of power, connecting the two warships for a long moment before disappearing.

"Impressive," Luke commented.

"My readings report a zero point two percent reduction in enemy shield strength," Data said. "As we suspected, the _Enterprise _will not be able to destroy the _Hammerfist _without our intervention."

Even as he spoke, the _Hammerfist _returned fire, turbolasers spitting green bolts at the _Enterprise_. The much smaller vessel swept along the Super Star Destroyer's axis at an impressive clip, eluding some of the fire, but the vast majority of the bolts struck home; the Federation battleship's shields shone a brilliant blue as they absorbed the energy.

"How are they holding up?" Luke asked.

"Eight percent shield loss in the port arc," Data replied. "Captain Picard will no doubt take advantage of the _Enterprise's _superior maneuverability to present undamaged shield facings whenever possible, but with this disparity in firepower and durability, I calculate we have eighteen minutes to accomplish our part of the mission before the _Enterprise_'s shields fail completely."

Bracing himself for the answer, Luke asked, "And how long after that would the _Enterprise _be destroyed?"

Data blinked. "Thirteen seconds."

"Right," Luke said. "So. Eighteen minutes. Got it."

Han's voice came in over the com system. "Heads up, Luke. I'm reading six squadrons of snubfighters launching. Looks like mixed squadrons of TIEs and Uglies."

"Good news for us then," Luke said.

Data looked at him. "TIEs? Uglies?"

"Twin Ion Engine fighters," Luke told him, "are flying deathtraps with no shields. Uglies are fighters cobbled together from other ships. Some of them are even more dangerous to fly in than TIEs."

"It seems the enemy's 'pile of money' was not large enough to equip his vessel with adequate fighter support, then," Data observed.

"Apparently not," Luke agreed. "Heads up! Here they come!"

The first wave of fighters was the TIEs, their faster engines bringing them into range of the shuttles and the _Falcon _before their Ugly counterparts. They unleashed a barrage of laser blasts, the bright green bolts burning against the black of space. Luke felt the shuttle rock a couple times with glancing hits, but the shields held. Data returned fire with the ship's weaponry, a less-powerful version of the energy beams the _Enterprise _mounted, and blew two TIEs out of the sky in less than a second.

"Shields are holding," Luke reported, then glanced over at the rangefinder display. "Thirty seconds." The Super Star Destroyer's forward hangar grew in the viewport with every passing moment. The rest of the shuttles were either going to the central or rear hangars, which meant they had many more kilometers to go than Luke and Data.

Even as he worried about that prospect, however, Luke saw the _Falcon _blaze wildly through the cloud of TIEs, spinning like a demented top and spraying quad laser fire in all directions. He grinned in spite of himself.

With the _Falcon _guarding them, he was sure the other shuttles would be fine.

* * *

Han indulged in one of his favorite Corellian oaths as the _Falcon _rocked with laser fire. "Shields are holding," he snapped, "but I sure wouldn't mind there being less fighters out there to shoot at us!"

"Fly better and we'll be able to aim at the fighters you want gone so badly," Chewie shot back a moment before he blew another TIE to shreds in a casual display of precision shooting. "And there are _six squadrons _out there, you realize. We're not going to be able to take them all by ourselves."

"We just have to get the rest of the shuttles to their target hangars and then we can fall back to run picket duty for the _Enterprise,_" Han growled, more as reassurance to himself than as a reminder to Chewie. "Hey, kid, you okay down there?"

There was a muted wretching sound, followed by a gasp from Routh. "I'm okay," he said. "You just spin a lot."

Han grinned and was about to give the ensign a good ribbing until he realized that one of the squadrons of Uglies was bearing down on them. These had the ball cockpits of TIE fighters and the S-Foils of an X-Wing.

They had also replaced the laser cannons normally mounted on the TIE cockpit with concussion missile launchers. Twelve seeker missiles roared from the squadron, aimed straight at the _Falcon. _Han swore, immediately pulling the freighter around to dive into the thickest concentration of TIE fighters. Four of the missiles exploded against enemy hulls in the first second. "Chewie, kid, take out those damn missiles!" he groaned through the stress of the _Falcon_'s maneuvers.

Both the _Falcon_'s turrets swiveled aft, and the two gunners opened up on the missile swarm. Han kept the ship dancing through the TIE formation, wheeling, taking advantage of his craft's ability to make tighter turns than the pursuing warheads. He watched the missiles explode all around them, cored by laser blasts or stopped short by the hulls of enemy TIEs.

A moment later they were through it, past the Uglies, and the Starfleet shuttlecraft bound for the central hangar were on their final approach. Han gave a loud _whoop_, then restrained a laugh at the surprised yell from Routh. "Sorry. Forgot you were on the other end of this thing," he said.

"Just glad to still be alive," Routh replied.

"Don't get cocky yet, kid," Han said. "This isn't done. Not by a long shot."

* * *

"The last infiltration teams are about to land," Deanna reported. "Only one shuttle was seriously damaged, and the men aboard managed to beam to another shuttle before their warp core blew. Luke and Data have already secured their hangar."

"Excellent," Picard said. "Number One, status?"

Will glanced over his shoulder at Picard with a grimace. "For such a big ship, it can roll pretty well," he said. "We're not going to be able to keep ahead of their weapons on impulse power like this. We need to get back into the ventral arc or the shields won't hold for long enough."

"Make it so, then," Picard ordered. "Mr. Daniels, before we retreat to the ventral arc of the _Hammerfist, _target quantum torpedoes at their bridge."

"The shields there should stand up even to quantum torpedoes, Captain," Daniels reminded him.

"I'm aware," Picard said. "I just want to send a message."

Daniels grinned at that. "Torpedoes ready, sir."

Picard leaned forward in his chair.

"Fire."


	6. Act Five

**VI**

Alvarro Griska gave an extremely undignified squeal of alarm as the enemy battleship launched four bright blue projectiles straight at the bridge. Their energy weapons were of little threat to his _Hammerfist, _but who knew what kind of destructive capabilities these might have –

"Calm yourself, Alvarro."

A moment later the projectiles detonated spectacularly against the bridge tower's enhanced shielding.

"We've lost track of the enemy battleship!" the sensor officer reported frantically. "The explosions have scrambled our instruments."

Alvarro straightened up in his seat and tried to regain some of his lost composure. "Track them! They must either be going into our ventral arc or retreating!"

"Oh, they'll be going into our ventral arc to avoid our guns. After all, they're not going to simply abandon the boarding parties they've sent out."

With a frown, Alvarro swiveled his chair to look at his partner. "You sound confident of that."

"Of course I am. After all –" a grin spread across the man's cultured features – "the Force is my ally."

"Then maybe you and the Force can worry about repelling the boarders with the pitiful complement of stormtroopers you've seen fit to provide me, while I deal with this meddlesome battleship," Alvarro snapped.

Brakiss, Dark Jedi and servant of the Second Imperium, stood smoothly from his chair, laying his hand on his lightsaber.

"It would be my pleasure."

* * *

"Looks like they've lost their fix on us for the moment, Captain," Will reported.

Picard nodded. "Very good, Number One. Let's stay within their engine shadow for as long as possible, then move along the ship's spine in the ventral arc once they find where we've gone. Counselor, how are the boarding parties doing?"

"Teams Two, Three, and Four have all landed successfully and secured their hangars," Deanna replied. "Data and Luke have begun advancing on the forward power generator."

"Excellent." Picard tapped the communications panel on his armrest. "Mr. La Forge, how are things in Engineering?"

"That ship packs a hell of a wallop," Geordi replied. "I'm going to use the time you've bought us to get our shields back to full, but the infiltration teams need to move fast. The shield emitters are getting taxed."

"Understood. Doctor, any casualties?"

"Some minor electrical burns and various contusions," Beverly told him. "We've got everything under control."

"Well done." Picard stood, tugging down his uniform out of habit, as he regarded the massive engine banks of the Super Star Destroyer on the viewscreen. "It falls to the infiltration teams, then."

* * *

Luke felt a surge of déjà vu as he and Data rounded a corner in the endless hallways that made up the interior of the Super Star Destroyer and saw a group of stormtroopers approaching. Suddenly he was back on the Death Star, angry at the Empire and intent on doing whatever he could to stop them. His new friends were all counting on him, their very lives were at stake, and he wasn't sure if he was up to the challenge.

A lot had changed since then.

As the stormtroopers snapped up their weapons and opened fire, Luke turned back the hail of blaster fire, lightsaber sweeping through the air. From behind him, Data, wielding a compression rifle, blasted two of the stormtroopers in the chest, downing them. Luke's deflected blaster bolts took down a third and fourth. The remainder hurriedly retreated into cover, where they began leaning around corners and over scattered supply crates to take potshots.

It made little difference. Luke effortlessly turned aside every blaster bolt the stormtroopers sent their way, while Data picked the enemies off one by one with inhuman accuracy. Thirty seconds later, they had cleared the hallway.

"Good work," Luke observed, hardly even breathing hard.

"It would seem the Force is indeed with us," Data replied, nodding at Luke's lightsaber. "Most impressive."

"I had good teachers," Luke said. "Are we close to the reactor?"

Data cocked his head for a moment. "Yes," he said. "Another two hundred twenty-seven meters."

Luke grimaced. "I guess that's _someone_'s idea of 'close.'"

They resumed their sprint down the hallway, Luke probing ahead with the Force this time to try to detect threats before they blundered into them. As they got closer to the reactor, Luke felt ice settle into his gut. He could feel the reactor ahead by the thrum of the deckplates, but there were no oscillations of energy in the Force. There was nothing at all.

"They have ysalamiri set up in there," Luke said grimly as they came to a halt in front of the sealed door to the reactor chamber.

"Pardon?" Data asked.

"Ysalamiri are little lizard creatures that push back the Force in an area around them," Luke explained. "There must be a dozen or more in there. When I'm near ysalamiri, I can't use the Force at all."

"That could prove problematic if there are more enemies waiting within," Data observed.

"Yeah, it could," Luke agreed. He gestured at the three rod-like objects Data carried in a harness on his back. "How fast can you set up those pattern enhancer things and get the torpedo beamed in?"

"Setting up and initializing the pattern enhancers will require thirty-nine seconds, as well as a large enough space for the torpedo to materialize."

Luke chewed at his lower lip. "Which means we can't really set them up in cover."

"The odds do tend toward that outcome, yes," Data said.

"Well, maybe we'll get lucky and there won't be anyone in there but techs," Luke said as he began to slice through the door. "This ship _is _pretty undercrewed."

As the door came down, a dozen stormtroopers opened up on Luke with their blaster rifles. He threw himself out of the way of the shots; since they came from inside ysalamiri bubbles, he didn't have nearly enough precognitive time to be able to deflect them.

"Damn," Data observed. He said the word carefully and precisely, like he was allocating an exact amount of rancor to the syllable.

Luke peeked around the edge of the doorframe before pulling his head back. The reactor was a giant, towering structure of puling light and smooth metal in the center of the room, rising several stories. It was ringed with catwalks, all of which were occupied by stormtroopers. Many of them carried ysalamiri on nutrient frames. The level on which Luke and Data stood had very little to protect them from enemy fire.

"If I may," Data said. "Give me your lightsaber. I will cover you while you set up the pattern enhancers and the _Enterprise _beams over the torpedo."

"…what?" Luke asked dumbly.

"My reflexes far exceed those of most organic beings," Data explained. "From my observations of your abilities while using the Force to deflect enemy fire, I would estimate a difference in our reaction times of no more than point zero zero eight seconds in your favor. The margin of error is small enough that I should be able to deflect the enemy fire using your lightsaber, provided we set up the pattern enhancers in a corner of the room where I only need cover a limited arc of fire."

Luke stared at the golden-skinned being for a second before another withering hail of blaster fire forced the issue for him. "If you say so," he said, "then I trust you." He deactivated his lightsaber and tossed it to Data, while the android detached the pattern enhancers from the harness and handed them to him before holstering his compression rifle.

"Stay behind me," Data said, thumbing the lightsaber to life.

He stepped through the doorway into the stormtroopers' line of fire. Almost immediately they inundated him with blaster fire, but Data whirled the lightsaber in a complex and tightly controlled pattern in front of him, scattering the incoming storm. Luke forced himself to stop staring and scurried into a corner of the room, ignoring the sudden Force deprivation which hit him like a physical blow. He quickly began positioning the pattern enhancers in a triangular formation. The devices, like all Federation technology, had been designed so even an idiot could use them.

Data's estimate of thirty-nine seconds had probably been contingent on his setting up the pattern enhancers and not Luke, but even so, he got them positioned in good order. Luke fumbled for his comlink, feeling clumsy and useless without the Force. "Luke to _Enterprise_," he said. "We are go for the fore reactor."

* * *

"Luke reports that they're ready at the fore reactor!" Deanna spoke up.

"Mr. Daniels, lock onto their signal and transport the first torpedo," Picard ordered.

Daniels nodded. "Aye, sir. Signal locked… torpedo away."

The _Enterprise _suddenly shuddered. "Status report, Number One!" Picard demanded.

"It looks like the _Hammerfist _figured out where we are," Riker replied. "It's powered its engines, but it's using maneuvering thrusters to keep it stationary. We're getting hammered by engine wash."

"Take us into their ventral arc immediately. Mr. La Forge, damage report."

"Shields took a beating, Captain," Geordi's voice crackled over the link. "That was a dirty trick. We lost a good twenty percent power in all arcs."

"See what you can do," Picard said grimly, taking his seat again. "Mr. Daniels, prepare to resume combat with the _Hammerfist _and detonate the first torpedo as soon as the infiltration team has reached a safe distance."

* * *

Han pulled the _Falcon _up and over the edge of the Super Star Destroyer, climbing out of the ship's ventral arc into its dorsal section. The hull of the massive vessel was a veritable mountain range of jutting towers and weapon emplacements. That meant Han had plenty of valleys in which to lose their considerable pursuit. The shuttlecraft they'd been protecting had all landed, so the _Falcon _was now alone.

"How we doing back there?" he demanded.

"There's still at least thirty fighters trying to fly up our exhaust ports," Chewie shot back over the com, the sound of his quad turret's rapid fire almost drowning out his voice. "How do you think?"

"We picked off the rest of those X-TIE Uglies, though," Routh said. "No more missiles to worry about."

"Well thank the Force for small favors," Han said, reflecting both on how Routh had picked up the nomenclature surprisingly fast and also how he could never let Luke hear him actually thanking the Force for anything. The farmboy would give him that annoying, sheepish grin and Han would never hear the end of it. "Hold on, this is gonna be interesting."

He threw the _Falcon _straight into a twisting, narrow trench between two rows of turbolaser turrets, enemy fighters still hot on his tail. Several of them collided in a massive pile-up as they tried to follow and exploded spectacularly, but most of them poured in after the _Falcon, _while others skimmed above the valley, firing down on the freighter from an angle.

Han juked about as best he could, knowing that Chewie would handle the fighters keeping their distance above them and Routh could discourage the ones on their tail. He usually preferred to let Chewie fly while he manned one of the gun turrets – not being able to do anything but dodge around didn't sit well with him – but Routh obviously couldn't fly the _Falcon _and, though Han would never admit it to anyone, Chewie was the better shot in a gun turret.

The com crackled with a new transmission from Picard. "Captain Solo, we're being forced to move into the _Hammerfist_'s ventral arc and we have incoming bombers. We could use your support."

"Just give me a minute," Han growled, standing the _Falcon _on its tail and blasting straight up out of the valley toward the cloud of fighters which had been firing down on them. He grinned, feeling no small amount of satisfaction as both his gunners cannily swiveled their aim to the fore and fired into the cloud of practically stationary targets, producing a beautiful chain of explosions.

Then the _Falcon _rang out with the impact of a lucky turbolaser blast. The panels above Han's head blew out instantly, showering him with sparks. The readouts no longer worked, but the whooping sound of an alarm told him everything he needed to know.

He uttered a long and colorful string of curses, conveniently forgetting to cut the transmission with Picard. "Chewie, the damn deflector's burnt out!"

"_What _did I tell you before we left?" Chewie bellowed. "I said –"

"Yeah, worst possible time, whatever! Get down there and fix it! Routh, you gotta cover our rear for a minute!"

"I'll try," the ensign's voice sounded over the com.

"Don't _try_ it," Han said exasperatedly, "_do _it. Or we might as well be vapor."

* * *

Luke jumped into the turbolift mere moments before Data joined him. The android was still wielding Luke's lightsaber, battering aside hails of blaster fire. Freed from the ysalamiri bubble, Luke gave the button sending them to the next target site a jab with the Force, closing the doors on the stormtroopers pursuing them.

"We're clear of the reactor," he said into the com. "Blow it!"

He felt the entire ship quake as the torpedo detonated, taking the reactor with it. The turbolift shuddered and died for a moment, the lights flickering, before the backup reactor took over.

"Well done," Data observed, deactivating Luke's lightsaber. "Here you are."

"Keep it for now," Luke replied. "Alvarro's probably got more stormtroopers with ysalamiri at the next target site. Dammit, we had no idea he was getting help from the Second Imperium!"

"A rival political entity to your New Republic?" Data asked.

"You could say that," Luke replied grimly. "Let's take out the backup reactor so we can get off this ship. The rest of the teams –"

He stopped as his comlink suddenly popped with a new transmission. "Is that you, Master Skywalker?" a familiar voice sounded. "It must be. Nobody else could destroy a reactor like that almost singlehandedly."

Luke felt a chill run the entire length of his spine. "Brakiss?" he asked. "You're the one behind Alvarro and the _Hammerfist_?"

"Guilty as charged," Brakiss laughed. "And I'm afraid I'm also guilty of disposing of the men you sent to destroy the computer core. Let's play a game – if you can beat me to your other set of boarders, the ones angling for the second primary reactor, maybe they won't all die the way your other team did."

"Brakiss, don't do this!" Luke said. "You don't have to follow this path, you can –"

The comlink went dead.

Data was silent for a moment. Then he asked, "Who is Brakiss?"

"A pupil of mine," Luke replied, his gut clenching. "Someone I thought I could turn from the dark path he was following."

"It seems you have been less than successful."

"I know." Luke closed his eyes, took a deep breath, thumbed the comlink. "Deanna? We have a problem."


End file.
